Naked rambler in the land of the Green Hairstreak

What if we all did it, Nigel? Our late, great colleague Don McPhee joined suitably-dressed ramblers on Kinder Scout to take this picture for the Guardian.

Naked rambling sounds like a complete no-no to me but it has a long tradition in the UK. The latest upholder of its supposed virtues is Nigel Keer who has just been fined for the practice on Otley Chevin, a place which Penny and I frequent, although always fully-clothed.

Keer has been convicted of an offence against public order after tramping around the steep hillside wearing boots, a backpack and a baseball cap.

He is a naturist of seven years' standing and has developed an interesting twist on previous attempts by ramblers to uphold this form of freedom, which have always been squashed by the courts. On his Chevin sortie, he kept a scorecard of reactions from passers-by, and claimed to have 15-0 approval when unfortunately he met an off-duty police officer.

Leeds magistrates heard an hour or so of enjoyable evidence, including PC Mark Buxton's description of the "disgusted frown" on the face of a woman dog walker who was also nearby. He told the court that initially he had had carried on with his daily run but then did a doubletake.

I was so shocked and surprised and to some degree alarmed by what I had just seen.

After arresting Keer, he told him to get dressed, which the rambler did among the bracken and bilberry plants overlooking a distractingly lovely stretch of lower Wharfedale. He had his clothes in the backpack.

I do accept that Mr Keer is a naturist but I note with some interest that he would not walk with his clothes off in the city centre of Leeds. On this occasion, a lady was clearly distressed by what she had seen going on.

Keer said that he didn't believe that the frowning lady ever existed and said:

I'm not happy with the decision and I plan to appeal. The surprise of seeing a naturist whilst you're out walking I don't think would be much different to seeing a steam train on the East Coast Main Line.

You can watch a Yorkshire Post film of him outside court here. He's fully clothed but there's a still of him in his walking outfit, with a placard hiding things. Some readers may frown.

The Black Hairstreak. The Green one is similar in size - there's a lovely photo of one on the link. Photograph: Heiti Paves/Alamy

Otley Chevin is also good place to see the Green Hairstreak butterfly in season. No doubt headline writers will make use of that if Keer goes skinny-rambling again. In fact, I'm going to use it myself on this.